Many Ontario university students are not satisfied with the food options available to them on campus, according to a recently released survey from Meal Exchange, a student food advocacy group.
It was conducted by interviewing 2,668 students and 15 campus food service representatives across a variety of Ontario universities.
The survey found that only one in four students agreed that the food options available on campus helped them maintain a healthy diet, while nearly one in two students are unhappy with their ability to access foods that are good for them and their communities.
Most students said that they wanted locally produced, healthy and sustainable food choices, but many were not satisfied with their availability.
Priya Thakkar, a third-year social work student at Carleton, said she agrees with this assessment.
“As far as I know, the cafeteria does use locally produced fruits and vegetables to cater to a variety of dietary restrictions students have,” she said. “However, it is quite difficult to access produce on our own. In first year I had a roommate who was vegan and found it very hard to maintain her diet because she couldn’t access fruits and vegetables when the caf was closed.”
According to the survey, only 55 per cent of Ontario university students agreed they had access to healthy, local foods on campus.
On the contrary, 79 per cent of university food service providers felt they were doing a good job of providing these options.
The authors of the survey suggest this disparity may be due to affordability issues, a pressure on food services to be self-financing and students being unaware of the efforts their campuses are making to increase healthy options.
“A lot of the time, we were finding that if campuses are trying to source more sustainable foods, students have no idea this is happening,” said Merryn Maynard, Meal Exchange’s program co-ordinator.
“It’s just because there is so little communication about those things with students,” she said.
The University of Guelph was assessed as the campus most satisfied with the availability of locally-grown food options on campus, out of 21 surveyed universities, while Carleton University ranked seventh.
Irena Knezevic, a Carleton University professor who assisted in the survey, suggests Carleton’s relatively high ranking is due to a dedicated staff working for Dining Services on campus.
“They’re usually aware of the issues around things like local foods, and supporting local food systems,” she said.
“We have a group of local people who work for a large corporation that is clunky and difficult to change, but are really a great staff who have done a lot of really progressive work to improve the food and beverages that are available,”Knezevic said.
Maynard agreed, and said Carleton could be on the verge of making more improvements, but communication with the student body is still a major issue.
“Carleton has been going through a request for proposal process, which means that they’re looking to find out which food service will provide food on campus for the next five to 10 years,” she said. “There’s a real opportunity right now for Carleton students to become involved in this process and to raise their voices around the types of changes they want to see on campus.”
Photo by Aaron Hemens
